The main reasons that insurance is more difficult to advertise than other products and services is that insurance is not 'wanted'. When someone wants something it's easier to advertise it. But people don't want it, and they don't want to think about it.

But first, let me quickly go over two types of advertising that are available to you. Branding (or awareness marketing), and direct response marketing. Within each insurance advertising alternative are sub categories. But mostly they pretty much go like this:

Advertising Alternative #1. Branding (a.k.a Awareness Marketing). Brand Advertising works like this: You blast your logo and company name with a catchy tag line or 'hook' -- even a jingle -- over and over until it's drilled into peoples heads. Hopefully they think of you when it's time to buy insurance.

Advertising Alternative #2: Direct Response. Direct response marketing works this way: You create an advertisement that asks your prospect to take an action. Like calling, going to a website, filling out a return reply card etc. etc., and you measure this response. That's it in a nutshell. Sounds basic, right?

This is more effective because you generate a list of prospects that have express interest in your insurance products, and they have given your permission to contact them again (assuming you are using lead generation and not asking for the sale up front, which is worth testing).

But the most important differences between alternative #1 and #2 is that #1 is not measurable, it's expensive, and it's a big gamble. Conversely, alternative #2, direct response marketing is measurable, you can test small until you have a winner.

I can't say that Branding doesn't work. It can work. But not very often. If you have a big insurance advertising budget and you want to try this kind of marketing, go for it. But I would take a chunk out of your budget and hire a copywriter to create direct response lead generate system and start generating leads for yourself or your agents. They (your agents) will thank you for it.